compromise that brought the country back again from crisis over south carolina's nullification of federal law. henry clay was a grand, remarkable man, and he never want to say no when he was invited to speak, to seek political attention. so we returned to washington and let the debate for seven months, attempting to persuade congressmen from the right and left in the south and the north to agree to a grande cup of ice, a grand bargain if you like, that would solve the slavery question once and for all. he failed. henry clay was pivotal to the debate but he failed in actually making a compromise real. he had put together one of the first omnibus bills and american political history, the omnibus collapsed. what happened? stephen a. douglas noted journalists at the time as a steam engine and bridges, very short, ferocious northern democrat come youngest man in the senate, 35, the marco rubio of his day perhaps, did what clay had not done. he did the numbers. in other words, what stephen a. douglas determined was that there were enough combination of votes in the senate to pass the different part